Book bombs

Corruption, poverty, tax mafia, Century, Lapindo, judicial mafia, criminality, political intrigue, human rights, drugs, indecisive leadership, apathy, Yogyakarta polemic, comparative studies etc...

Observers say that a series of book bombs over the last week marks a new peak in the spate of violence against those fighting for a pluralist society and that the attacks are designed to ignite the "time bomb" accumulating public discontent against the government.

Kompas - March 26, 2011

Setting your beard on fire

Kid: There's no point setting your beard on fire (getting in a twist, a panic, furious) Mr, you're the one who didn't keep it trim and neat (to keep one's own house in order)!

The Presidential Palace has denied reports that a "furious" President Yudhoyono refused to take a phone call from US President Barack Obama in the wake of WikiLeak's allegations published by The Age last week. Yudhoyono has vehemently denied that his wife used her position for personal profit labeling the allegations untrue and a character assassination.

Kompas - March 19, 2011

Dividing up the cake

Cake tray reads: Coalition

Papers in bin read: Bank Century, tax mafia inquiry, reshuffle

President Yudhoyono is again using the threat of a cabinet reshuffle and offers of lucrative slices of the cabinet cake to bully recalcitrant government coalition partners into dropping legislative inquires into corruption at the tax office and a renewed push to reopen the Bank Century bailout inquiry.

Kompas - March 12, 2011

A senior official has resigned

1st Man: A senior official has resigned over an illegal donation...

2nd Man: So they're serious about creating clean governance then?

1st Man: Not here, in Japan...

Headline: Japanese FM resigns.

A series of graft and sex scandals involving senior politicians – and their furious denials of wrongdoing in the face of irrefutable evidence – has again highlighted the culture of impurity and unaccountability prevalent among Indonesia's elected officials.

Kompas - March 9, 2011

Apartment of Lies

Man: I wander what that pepesan tastes like?

Sign: Apartment of Lies (empty pepesan) – referring to food, mostly fish, cooked in banana leafs, pepesan kosong – "looks tasty but nothing inside", a lie or bluff.

A blame game as erupted between Jakarta officials over scores of low-cost housing apartments built over the last few years that remain unoccupied as residents refuse to move in because they still have no water or electricity.

Kompas - March 2, 2011